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Vendors team up on sensors, comms systems for GCAP next-gen fighter
ROME — British, Italian and Japanese firms set to build sensors and communications systems for the GCAP fighter have formed a UK-based consortium ready to sign a design and development contract with the platform’s lead integrators.
Known as GCAP Electronics Evolution (G2E), the consortium groups Leonardo and ELT Group from Italy, Leonardo UK and Mitsubishi Electric representing Japan, the firms said at the DSEI show in London.
Led by Leonardo UK manager Andrew Howard, G2E will be based in Reading near London, close to the office of GIGO, the Italy-UK-Japan government office running GCAP, and Edgewing, the tri-nation industrial joint venture set up by integrators BAE Systems (UK), Leonardo (Italy) and Japan Aircraft Industrial Enhancement Co. Ltd. (Japan).
“We can’t be an arms length supplier, we need to be deeply embedded on the program and this is the next piece of the jigsaw on GCAP after GIGO and Edgewing,” said Howard, who is currently Director Future Combat Air UK, Leonardo UK FCAS.
The consortium marks the next step in the team-up between the firms after they signed a collaboration deal at DSEI Japan in 2023.
“It’s the next chapter. We have been proving our technology on the UK Tempest fighter program since 2018, then working with our international partners and now the requirement has given us enough to set up work sharing and play to our strengths,” said Howard.
“The governments are satisfied their national champions have the skill sets,” he added.
In a statement released on Sept. 9, the firms said, “The four companies will work together to deliver the next-generation combat aircraft’s advanced sensing and communication system, known as Integrated Sensing and Non-Kinetic Effects & Integrated Communications Systems (ISANKE & ICS), as well as the system’s decades-long Through-Life Support Service (TLSS).”
It added, “The integration and exploitation of the vast amount of information that will be available in the future operational environment will be one of the key differences that will set the GCAP core platform apart from previous generations of combat aircraft.”